I’m reading yet another NY Times best seller that has a young lady grabbed in a public place and put in the trunk of a car and subsequently murdered. It’s the third book I’ve read in the last 3 months with the same plot. It caused me think about books, movies, TV shows, TV news, and video games. Is there a link between this and the real violence in our country today?
Local news in Chicago has a dominant theme. Who got shot where in Chicago today? National news has a story every week of a child missing or murdered.
Does all of this normalize or minimize violence or even encourage this behavior. Someone sent me the video with Willie Nelsen singing over the pages of what we were watching in the 50’s and 60’s. Except for the cowboy shows most were violence free. And, little of the news was devoted to headlining violence, perhaps because there was less to report.
Check your TV guide. How many prime time shows today are shows with violence? Check the paper with the movies and see how many are based on violence. Watch your local news and see what events are at the top of the show. Watch Network News, if you can stand to be spun, and see what is selling as news.
Are we as Americans reaping what we sow? Young people are impressionable. Sick people are susceptible to triggers and ideas. Are our choices of entertainment making this country more dysfunctional?
Until now, I have never bought this idea. I’ve never thought censorship is the answer to anything. Still don’t. However, self-discipline might be in order. Maybe we need to find books, movies, and news that can still entertain and inform but not include violence.
I know this. I don’t need to read one more best-selling novel where a young lady is kidnapped and put in a trunk and murdered. That plot has worn thin with me and maybe I’ve had my fill of violence both fictional and real. Don’t need a fourth CSI show.
